


shush

by Blownwish



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Adultery, Anal Sex, Angst, Cheating, Kissing, M/M, Spanking, backround AlWin, backround EdWin, sad stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-26 11:05:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13234362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blownwish/pseuds/Blownwish
Summary: Al left, Ed stayed. Sometimes Ed even feels alive. This is one of those times. (RoyEd)





	shush

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cowania](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Cowania).



> Here’s my [RoyEd Gift Exchange](https://royedgiftexchange.tumblr.com/) gift for [Cowania](http://cowania.tumblr.com). Hope you enjoy it. [TheHatLady](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheHatLady/pseuds/TheHatLady) beta’d (for cookies!) and gave me some very helpful advice. Any errors are mine, written while I revised. I am very grateful. Thank you.

Edward Elric isn’t here. He isn’t anywhere, anymore, even though it looks like he’s opening the hotel door. “General. Took you long enough.” 

“I brought whiskey.” 

Of course he did. That’s what he always does — brings whiskey to pretend he’s there, too. It’s already open and he smells like he’s somehow jumped inside the bottle and drowned. 

Can you drown if you’re already dead? Edward wants to follow him and find out. At least he will be following another dead man. A fellow traveler. “Probably cheap as fuck.” Edward drinks. He chokes, but he still manages to suck some down. He whirls around the peeling wallpaper until Mustang catches him. And he smiles. It’s almost like Mustang even cares. 

But this isn’t about caring. This is about pretending. Mustang takes the bottle. “Because I’m cheap as fuck.” It’s true. Getting Mustang to fuck him the first time, years ago, barely took effort the first time. Just a note with a place and a time, and Mustang there, ready and more than willing. 

“Sometimes I wonder why I still need this.” Edward needs more whiskey to stop up the words. But he’s not going to get it. Mustang’s already put it somewhere. “Why do I need anything, really?” He’s not really alive, after all. 

Mustang snorts. “Are you done crying?”

Oh. Was that sarcasm? Edward grins. He remembers the back and forth and it feels good. It feels like the old days. Like that _I love you, I hate you_ fire in the belly. “Thanks for the reminder, asshole.” He means it. He really does. 

But he needs more. 

“Hurry up.” Edward tries to undo his pants, but Mustang’s smacking his hands out of the way. He’s yanking and tearing and he pushes up Edward’s shirt. And he looks up. Looks into Edward’s eyes. 

“Duly noted.” He’s still wearing his gloves. They’re rough at the tips, tacky at the palms, and they drag over Edward’s skin. 

Edward can almost feel it. But he needs more. Mustang’s uniform, there are too many buttons, too much wool and cotton and he needs to find what is left of Mustang underneath. His skin — oh, there it is, rough and scarred and there, right there — his skin is warm. Somehow. Maybe it’s the whiskey. 

Mustang closes his eyes when Edward touches him. Nods when his hand slips down, not even noticing this twitch, nerve damage won’t let Ed curl around Mustang’s dick. All he can do is palm it, mash it against Mustang’s crotch and watch Mustang exhale. “I wish I didn’t have to come here,” he tells Edward. 

“Shut up.” There’s no point in lying. Not here. Not now. Edward surges up and takes Mustang’s mouth. He bites. He tastes whiskey, he tastes regret, and Mustang bites him back. Grabs his face and devours Edward, as if there is anything left. 

They fall into the mattress, where Ed is pressed into the stained comforter and his pants are shoved to his ankles and Roy is spitting in his hand. He’s jerking Edward off like he’s priming a pump. Edward bends his automail leg. Its sensors tremble and its toes curl and Edward shivers as Mustang leans over to lick the puckered skin near the metal. Then the flesh of Edward’s inner thigh. “I wish I could make love to you in my bed.”

This is the shit people say when someone is dead. But Mustang is not people. They used to call military men dogs, but he’s not even that. He’s a ghost. A ghost with a body. The man he was died somewhere in Ishval. 

And Edward is a ghost with a body, too. “Fuck you.” He smiles when Mustang laughs and he even kicks back. Mustang catches his foot and flips him over. Pulls his ass up and smacks it. Edward tosses his head back and snarls when Mustang grabs his braid and yelps when he yanks and he’s thankful. Grateful. He’d never say so. But he doesn’t need to. Mustang understands. 

He slaps Edward’s ass, again. “Behave, Elric.”

“God, why don’t you just fuck me, you pathetic piece of shit? All your flowery bullshit about love and fluff? What the fuck good does it even do?”

He licks where he smacked him. Digs his fingers into Edward’s hips and bites. “Remember the first time? That room in Central?” Edward can feel him huff against his skin. “Remember how you cried when I made you come. And you kept crying, baby boy. No matter how long I held you afterward.”

He was just fifteen. Just fifteen and a million years old, aching and broken and hungry for the slightest touch, even if it was from the world’s biggest bastard. “Yeah. You liked that.”

“Don’t cry, tonight.”

Is it an order? Edward bites the pillow. He’s not Mustang’s direct report anymore. He’s not _anything_ anymore. He’s not an alchemist. He’s not a husband to his wife. He’s not even his son’s _father_. No, he’s collection of memories. He is ruled by recollection and regret. Tears get blotted away before they can show. But he can’t hold back the sob when he hears the soft pop of Mustang’s little bottle of mineral oil. “Come on!” 

The pans are still around his ankles. His shirt hangs like a shroud, but Edward’s body jerks as if he’s alive when Mustang pushes one finger in. “Shhh.” Mustang pets his hair. 

Edward whimpers. 

++

She was in love with his brother. She was in love and she didn’t care about all the warnings Edward gave her. “You’re not the only one,” Edward told her in that little room she crammed herself and all her tools in. “Don’t get me wrong. I love him. He’s my brother. But he is obsessed.”

“You can’t stand to see us happy.” Winry tossed her wrench on the table. At least it wasn’t his head. “Face it, Edward. You’ve never been in love. You wouldn’t understand.”

He remembered marching out of the old wood frame house looking for something to break. He found himself at the station with a train ticket, instead. And he was going to go. He was going to go to East City and he was going to let that bastard get him wasted and ball him again, just like he did before Edward became the worthless Elric brother who couldn’t even fix a leaky roof.maybe Edward would feel something like alive. 

“Watchya doin’ brother?”

Edward watched the clouds. “Whatever I want.” He knew Al would show up to laugh at his sour face and tell him to lighten up or get over it or fuck all. “Why don’t you go fuck Alison? She gets a lunch break from the ticket booth, soon.” 

He shook his head. “Fine.” Al stood in front of him, blotting out the sun. “Come on. You know you want to. I’m catting around town. I’m a disgrace to our name. Isn’t that what you say? So do it.” Sunshine shimmered behind him.

Edward stood up. He looked his brother over. Yeah, he wasn’t a suit of armor anymore, and he wasn’t a weak bag of bones, either. He was a big, tall flesh and blood bastard, now. “She loves you.”

“I love her, too.” 

Edward didn’t know who threw the first punch. All he knew was Al ended it with a pass at his jaw. He straddled Edward. “You don’t know how I feel about her, brother. You have no idea how I feel.”

Edward shoved him away. “You’re right. Because if I could be with someone. Someone I could love — I would never — “ He closed his eyes. Who was he kidding? Mustang would never live with him. Would never admit that he slept with a man who was hardly more than a boy. And here was Al, squandering something Edward would have given anything for. 

“You look just like Dad when you’re angry.”

“Tell you what.” He took the ticket out and shoved it in Al’s shirt pocket. “Have a little fun in the City. On my dime, right. Fuck some girls. Have some beers. Catch the clap.” He leaned in and whispered. “At least I don’t act like the old man.”

And with that, Edward walked back to the Rockbell house. 

Al must’ve left on that twelve o’clock northbound train. The crazy asshole had no suitcase and a bloody lip. And he never came back. He never wrote, never called. Not until he made it halfway across the world to Xing. 

By that time it was too late. 

++

Edward is a quivering, shivering mess. He’s sobbing. He’s begging. “Please, god! Fuck! Just please make me come!” That’s why he’s here. That’s why he came on the long lonely train with the dead weight of absolution on his shoulders. _I don’t expect you to love me. Not like that._ His wife forgave him for not being his brother. His brother forgave him for marrying his lover. The world, for whatever reason, forgave him despite all the pain and all the misery he caused and could never make up for. Only Mustang understands. That’s why he spanks Ed’s ass while he’s pushing three fingers inside. That’s why he’s smacking his dick against his hip. Why he’s treating Edward like a bitch. He’s shushing the whines. Ignoring the pleas. Dead men have no pity. Dead men need none. 

Edward gasps as he’s flipped over and Edward wails as Mustang pulls off the rest of his clothes until he is bare and he is naked and he is staring at the ceiling, at the wall, at anything other than Mustang, until Mustang grabs his chin and makes him. _“I would’ve loved you.”_

He feels as if he’s falling when Mustang sees him. Sees through him. And then he hits the ground when Mustang thrusts. He hits the ground and he breaks apart. 

_”I would’ve loved you! Why didn’t you let me love you?”_

Because it’s not enough. Not enough to make them something fit to live. Because they owe too much after everything they have done. Everything they have failed to do. Because Edward _wanted Mustang to love him_ , and he can’t have what he wants. He can never have what he wants. What he wants is selfish. 

Mustang destroys what’s left of Edward and rearranges him with every hard push. With a kiss so soft, Edward can barely breathe. Breathes into Edward's mouth. “Why wouldn’t you?” And when he reaches down, when he touches Edward, he finds the one thing that feels almost like life inside of them both. 

They don’t just come. They live again, for just a moment, and then it’s gone. 

++

She was beautiful, standing at the county clerk's office in the simple white dress her mother wore. No lace, soft cotton and a sweet smile of gratitude — Winry cried when they said their vows. They kissed for the first time and they were married. The ring felt odd. The necktie felt like a noose. All Edward could think of was equivalent exchange. It was all his fault. He had to make it right. 

During their honeymoon in the Dew Drop Inn, he held her hair as she puked in a bucket. He argued with her when she refused to eat breakfast and didn’t stop until she finally had a bite of toast. Some water. Hell — he was actually thrilled when she drank some milk. “You gotta eat, Win. You got to.” 

“I know.” For once she didn't fight back. She just put her hand on her belly and her head on his shoulder. “Thank you.” He knew what she was thanking him for. 

He put his hand over hers. “Anytime.” Over his brother’s child. It was his fault Al wasn’t there. It was his fault. Everything he ever did was always his fault. “I’m sorry.” He wanted to say it to Al. To the baby. And someone else. 

She didn’t know why he apologized. All she knew, was that Edward was there. 

++

He never took off his clothes. 

Edward realizes this as he lays on his back, watching Mustang piss into the toilet through the flap in his military skirt. 

“I’m leaving on the late train at eighteen hundred hours.” Edward doesn’t know why he uses military time. Maybe he feels like he’s back in the military. The two runs and Mustang glances over the sink. “I’m not staying overnight.”

He uses two hand towels before he puts on the gloves with a slow, deliberate tugs. “You want the rest of the bottle?” State Alchemist gloves are tight, and they fit Mustang’s hand like a second skin. “For the ride?”

“Thanks but - “ he stands and he stretches and he can’t look at him anymore. “ - can’t turn up blind drunk in the morning.” Edward can’t say her name, either. Can’t say it in front of him. 

Mustang puts the bottle on the end table and faces the label to the front. “Blue Dog. I thought you’d appreciate the reference.” He almost smiles. Then he leaves. 

Of course he leaves. Everybody leaves. “Roy!” Edward windes when Mustang stops at the door. He says nothing. He simply waits. “I - If things were different -“ Mustang bows his head and Edward can’t say anymore. Can’t do anymore as the door opens. As Mustang is about to step out the door. As Edward is about to let him go, again. 

And then it happens. Mustang’s skirt whirls and Mustang is a flash of blue and suddenly Mustang is taking him up in his arms and Mustang is cupping his face and Mustang walking him back, slams him up against the wall, and Mustang is kissing him, over and over. “Oh, god! _Edward!_ ”

++

He can remember that Sunday as if it was yesterday. The sun was setting in the hills as she sat next to him in the porch swing. She came bearing gifts: tea and pie. Edward watched two sparrows shoot out of Granny’s Birch in different directions. 

“Do you know where he went?” Her eyes were so wide. Her lips were trembling. “Tell me?”

“I wish I knew.” He wanted to beg her forgiveness. He wanted to confess. But what would that leave her? What would it do? 

He held his breath as she stared. He kept holding it as she slowly nodded. He looked down as her hand covered his. At their hands. It looked odd. It felt odd. “He’s really gone, isn’t he?”

Edward swallowed. Hard. “What’ll you do?”

“I don’t know.” 

He squeezed her hand, wrapped his arm around her, and they watched the sunset as they stared far beyond the hills. “I got a crazy idea, Win. Just hear me out.” He’d said something like that before, but Al wasn’t there to remind him. 

One month later, Edward took the late train to East City. “I don’t know how to tell you this.” He held up his hand. Mustang saw the ring. “Just that it had to be in person.”

He expected Mustang to yell. He saw his face turn red and then he saw him clench his teeth - but then he saw him take a deep breath. And nod. “Does this mean this is over?” 

“Don’t you dare jump to any confusions. You understand me, shithead?” He grabbed Mustang’s fucking perfect started collar and shook for all he was worth. “She’s having brother’s baby.” He snarled. “He’s gone and it’s my fault. _My fault_. I should’ve told him.” He whimpered. He let go and whimpered because he hated how weak, how absurd he sounded. “Told him how lucky he was. He could’ve lived with the one he -“ He sobbed. “Just because I can’t? I’m so petty. So selfish. I don’t -“

Even a bastard like Mustang didn’t need this. A glorious, beautiful bastard Edward was going to curse for the rest of his life for making him think that maybe he could be happy. Edward pushed past him. 

Almost. 

Mustang pulled him in his arms and held him. “Shhh.” He combed his fingers through Edward's hair, softly. Gently. 

Then, not so gently.


End file.
